Double trouble: one hour, two hat-tricks

Cricket is a funny game, they say, and some of that funniness was on show at the Plunket Shield, New Zealand's first-class competition. Here's what happened: two bowlers took a hat-trick almost at the same time, each in his own little corner of New Zealand. If that weren't coincidental enough, these two players - Wellington's Logan van Beek and Auckland's Matt McEwan - both claimed their hat-tricks across two overs, they both previously played for Canterbury, and, erm, they both went to the same school (Christchurch's St Andrew's College).

According to a New Zealand Cricket (NZC) release, this was the first time in the Plunket Shield's 112-year history that two hat-tricks were taken on the same day of the competition. Van Beek was the first to complete his set (the 40th Plunket Shield hat-trick), in the fourth and sixth overs as his old team Canterbury capitulated in their second innings down south in Christchurch.

Matt McEwan in his delivery stride Getty Images

Within the hour, McEwan's strikes followed (the 41st Plunket Shield hat-trick), carving up Northern Districts' middle order in the 26th and 28th overs of their first innings up north in Auckland. (A video of the two hat-tricks, courtesy NZC, is here.)

And all this in the first round of Plunket Shield games after a two-month break to fit in the limited-overs competitions. First-class cricket, back with a bang?